Meeting MY Dress

In the beginning of November, I received a card in the mail from CC’s (where I bought my dress) letting me know that my gown had arrived in the shop! I was floored; when I purchased it back in June they had informed me that it could take up to early 2010 for the gown to come in. I guess not!!!

As you can imagine, the anticipation for my Florida trip for Thanksgiving was incredible. I wanted to meet my gown in person!

So, on the rainy Tuesday before Thanksgiving, mom and I made the drive out to St. Petersburg. If you remember, when I shopped for my dress originally, I didn’t get those mushy-gushy “OH MY GOSH THIS IS MY DRESS” feelings. I was secretly hoping that they would appear that day. I should have known better than to have that expectation, because alas, once again it didn’t happen. Sadly, it kind of threw me into a bit of a bad mood during our visit, which I shouldn’t have let happen. But hey, I’m not perfect.

However, I WAS excited about the fact that MY dress was in a much smaller size than the sample I tried on was in! When I was fitted for my gown, we found out that the smallest size James Clifford makes is a 2, so we had to go ahead and order it, despite the fact that the measurements were still going to be off. Darn you, awkward wedding dress sizing! From what I have heard around the wedding blog land, typically you wear a size or two up from your street clothes size. Hm. Apparently James Clifford runs more true to size than I would have thought! As it stands, they don’t make a size 0 dress, so I was out of luck; we are going to have to alter it!

Ok, ok…I know what you really want is to see pictures of me in the dress. Your wish is my command. Justin, if you are reading this, STOP! Do not pass go, do not collect $200. Walk away from your computer, do not scroll down! Please? Ok thank you…

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If you can’t tell, the bust is huge, but probably because I have so little to work with to start! That is definitely going to be taken in, and some “support” is going to be sewn in. The waist and hips are also too large, and will have to be taken in a few inches. Check out the handful of fabric the seamstress has in her hands!

Thankfully, they informed me that all of the alterations were rather simple in nature to complete, so I could hold off on being measured and pinned until a return visit at a later date. Whew! 6 months of not being able to fluctuate my dress size would have been absolute torture! Can you imagine?

I had a bit of a subdued temper tantrum (in my head mostly) when I first saw the train. It looked completely different to me than the original sample…the lace was bunching around the train and it looked sloppy to me. Thankfully, the seamstress brought me out the sample so I could compare them, and we realized that the lace on the train was connected to the lining on the dress, and that in the sample it had been detached. Easy fix! The seamstress went ahead and cut the strings connecting the two pieces, and I was instantly relieved. See the difference?

Sample dress (with major clippage going on in front to make it appear like it fits!)

Before the fix

After the fix

Ok, enough about all the dress details…I’ll leave you with a few more pictures…

How long did it take for your dress to come in? Were you pumped to meet it in person?